Question About Pro Caddies Marking Off Yardages?

[Kdaniel72]

I noticed at the Valero this year that the caddies would start at the very back of the tee box and step off yards to the markers on the tee box for the professionals drives. I understand it has to do with yardages but to what extent? What does that tell them and how are holes 🕳 measured?

[Hawkeye77]

Likely checking current tee markers against whatever distance benchmark they have given the markers aren’t the same every day.

Edited June 23, 2021 by Hawkeye77

[b.helts]

The yardage books will have distances from the back of the tee box to the front of the green, on par 3s.

 

On some holes there will be yardages from the back of the tee box to carry a bunker or to the front of a bunker, etc.

[Kdaniel72]

Is that on all PGA courses?

[b.helts]

Yes. Mark Long used to caddie for Fred Funk. Now he makes the yardage books the guys use. They are incredibly detailed and caddies will frequently keep their yardage books year after year. Many have their own shorthand for yardages and clubs hit along with the conditions in which they hit them.  
 

Every hole will start with yardages from the back of the box to whatever landmarks/obstacles are out there.

[Creedo77]

7 hours ago, Kdaniel72 said:

I noticed at the Valero this year that the caddies would start at the very back of the tee box and step off yards to the markers on the tee box for the professionals drives. I understand it has to do with yardages but to what extent? What does that tell them and how are holes 🕳 measured?

Its to get the run out and cover numbers of bunkers or anything else that’s out there that’ll come into play off the tee 

 

most yardage books are measured off the back of the last tee box. Luckily when they move a tee box up the book indicates how many paces it is to the next box so it saves us some steps 😉

Edited June 24, 2021 by Creedo77

[c7015]

Don't have mine handy but ya they measure from the back or front of the box and show you a slew of info to better plan your shot 

 

 

 

[smashdn]

At first I thought it odd that the books give you yardages to the front of the green and not the middle (like most sprinkler heads) but then I recalled what an event pin placement sheet looks like.  Since they are measured off the front and give green depth and distance form front to hole you can easily add the yardage to wherever you are in the fairway (or rough) to get the best approximation of the linear distance.

[ChipNRun]

I volunteered for the 2018 PGA Championship at Bellerive. During the practice rounds, I walked nine with a competing club pro and his caddie. The caddie said that one of the things he plots is the "miss points" for getting out of trouble. He does this these on holes where there's trouble other than rough if you miss the fairway. He plots distance to green AND to a less aggressive "miss point" or safe spot for just getting ball back into play.

 

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Wish I had thought of pacing yardage from the backmost tee in competition rounds. At an August amateur circuit championship a couple of years back, we had a No. 9 hole with a creek crossing the landing area. The hole had about seven different tee box areas, rather than the normal four.

 

We thought the blocks were at the same spot as the prior day, as a cement-encased trash can was to left of tee box. So, we all took hybrids or long irons to lay up to the creek. When we got to the landing area, the spotter surprised us with news: Three of us had flown our tee shots into the creek.

 

It turned out the greens crew had moved the tee blocks - and the cement-encased trash can !  - twenty yards forward. Had we known this, we would have taken drivers and flown the creek.

 

A good case for pacing off from the back tee if there's hazards in hole's landing area.

Edited July 3, 2021 by ChipNRun